The Outlook For Jobs

With unemployment continuing to remain at an uncomfortably high rate, observers are left to wonder when the federal government will actually begin to adopt pro-growth policies that will help to bring unemployment down to a much lower percentage.

For now, the AP comments on the type of workers that will continue to do best in this low-growth environment.

"Whenever companies start hiring freely again, job-seekers with specialized skills and education will have plenty of good opportunities. Others will face a choice: Take a job with low pay — or none at all.

Job creation will likely remain weak for months or even years. But once employers do step up hiring, some economists expect job opening to fall mainly into two categories of roughly equal numbers:

• Professional fields with higher pay. Think lawyers, research scientists and software engineers.

• Lower-skill and lower-paying jobs, like home health care aides and store clerks.

And those in between? Their outlook is bleaker. Economists foresee fewer moderately paid factory supervisors, postal workers and office administrators."

This should be no surprise to anyone following the job market. Given the fact there are so many people unemployed, those without specialized skills will be competing with that many more people to fill open positions.

However, there was an additional quote provided in the article that is typical of those who expect the government to solve all ills.

"The big fear is the country is simply not preparing workers for the kind of skills that the country is going to need," says Gautam Godhwani, CEO of SimplyHired.com, which tracks job listing."

It's not clear exactkt what the CEO means by suggesting that the "the country" is not preparing people for jobs.

Historically, each American has been responsible for preparing him or herself for the job market.

Yes, schools do provide a basic level of education, but ones work ethic and ability to solve problems and think constructively, which are all instrumental to success in the workplace and being of value to employers, were not something that were given to anyone but rather were earned and developed over time.

In short, bringing unemployment rates back down and in line with historical norms is not a matter of the government providing myriad training programs to unemployed Americans, but rather a multistep process that sees a) the government removing itself from the economy as much as possible and b) each individual taking actions and steps that prepare themselves for being of use to employers